Nicol prism

At each end of the tube is a Nicol prism or other polarizer.

The polarimeter is made up of two Nicol prisms (the polarizer and analyzer).

A Nicol prism consists of a Calcite crystal which has been cut into two halves.

Another important application of Canada Balsam is in the construction of the Nicol prism.

The projectors used Nicol Prisms for polarization.

It was Albert Riggenbach who worked out how to increase the contrast by using a Nicol prism to filter polarized light.

A Nicol prism is a type of polarizer, an optical device used to produce a polarized beam of light from an unpolarized beam.

The tube was closed by glass at its ends, and was filled with carbon bisulphide or water, and the liquid was between two nicol prisms.

When it is allowed to pass through a Nicol prism then its vibrations in all directions except the direction of axis of the prism are cut off.

Scolecite can therefore be distinguished from natrolite by an optical examination, since the acicular crystals do not extinguish parallel to their length between crossed nicol prisms.

Nicol prisms greatly facilitated the study of refraction and polarization, and were later used to investigate molecular structures and optical activity of organic compounds.

Using transmitted light and Nicol prisms, it was possible to determine the internal crystallographic character of very tiny mineral grains, greatly advancing the knowledge of a rock's constituents.

In most instruments, however, Nicol prisms have been replaced by other types of polarizers such as Polaroid sheets and Glan-Thompson prisms.

If two Nicol prisms are placed with their polarization planes parallel to each other, then the light rays emerging out of the first prism will enter the second prism.

Nicol Prism - The new version of the twin towers, WTC members of the architectural complex, is inaugurated on 1 May 2012 without much fanfare.

A Nicol prism was an early type of birefringent polarizer, that consists of a crystal of calcite which has been split and rejoined with Canada balsam.

As the inventor of the 'Nicol prism', his name will continue to be remembered well beyond the world of optical physics, but details of his early life are hard to discover.

Nicol prisms were once widely used in microscopy and polarimetry, and the term "using crossed Nicols" (abbreviated as XN) is still used to refer to the observing of a sample placed between orthogonally oriented polarizers.

Nicol prisms produce a very high purity of polarized light, and were extensively used in microscopy, though in modern use they have been mostly replaced with alternatives such as the Glan-Thompson prism, Glan-Foucault prism, and Glan-Taylor prism.

Petrography as a science began in 1828 when Scottish physicist William Nicol invented the technique for producing polarized light by cutting a crystal of Iceland spar, a variety of calcite, into a special prism which became known as the Nicol prism.

William Nicol, whose name is associated with the creation of the Nicol prism, seems to have been the first to prepare thin slices of mineral substances, and his methods were applied by Henry Thronton Maire Witham (1831) to the study of plant petrifactions.